Author's Note: So, wow! I didn't know anyone was still reading this. I figured it got too long and boring and people just kind of folded. I'm glad to know that people are stilling enjoying it though, that's pleasing. To steam-rolled: I can't make any promises, though I can certainly tell you that I don't plan on killing off Sawyer, as I at least try to maintain some canon basis. On the other hand, I'm thinking of taking a drastic turn with Heather, something that should hopefully tie in with what is to come once the episodes start back up, and the survivors have to deal with finding Walt.

To arwen: thank you! I'm actually surprised there isn't more of the supernatural Lost stuff out there--I mean, realistic stuff is absolutely wonderful, but it's almost like some Lost fanfic writers don't even want to take a chance with acknowledging that the island has some very strange supernatural stuff going on with it. I'm glad you've enjoyed my fanfic so far.


"But if you could hide beside me
Maybe for a while,
And I won't tell no one your name.
- -
Don't it make you sad to know that life
Is more than who we are?"
Goo Goo Dolls

Chapter Twenty-Six

Sometime later, Sawyer wakes to emptiness in his arms. They had lay down to get some rest, with him loosely holding Heather and resting on his uninjured arm. Sitting up, he can see her silhouette outlined by the smoldering, dying embers of the fire. The night, endless as it was, seems finally ready to break—and he has the feeling that this is the last calm before the storm: time would redouble, speed up, make up for the reprieve it had given them, and probably then some. Jin and Michael are further away, Jin's head slumped to his chest. Michael, however, is still silently looking out over the ocean.

Sawyer brushes himself off, goes over to Heather. She draws away from him uncharacteristically, and he realizes that she is crying—and that shouldn't surprise him, but it does. She had managed to hold back tears as long as he had known her, and this was upsetting.

"Sweetheart," And the word isn't cutting or sarcastic, but gruff and full of concern. He sits, tries to draw her to him, as best he can. She pushes him away, none too lightly, and he sighs.

"It's my fault. It's all my fault." Her voice is wavering and watery with tears, her head is buried into her arms, which rest on her propped up knees, not letting Sawyer see her face. "Michael's right, if I could have only done more-"

"It's not your fault." He swallows hard, winces. "It's my fault, if it's anyone's. I made Michael use the flare, even though he didn't want to. That's how They found us."

"And I made you go. I didn't-" There is a break in her voice, when her throat becomes too tight with emotion to work. "I didn't even know. I didn't feel anything. I even… I even told Jack that they were safe. No one was coming for them. I was too worried about… about-"

"Me?" His tone is tight, jaw clenched. She sniffles, makes a low groan, but there is no dissent.

"I could have stopped it. I could have. If I had just come sooner, and I didn't. I shouldn't have bothered with the rest of them. I should have left. I could have stopped-"

"Don't." A callused hand lifts her chin, though she struggles (without any real enthusiasm) against it. Her eyes are puffy, red, swollen, her cheeks wet. "You'll start to sound like the Doc if you keep this up," He adds, attempting humor, though his voice is burdened with its own guilt. She tries to smile, probably to make him feel better, but it fails terribly, turning into a couple of wrenching sobs. Not exactly what Sawyer was hoping for, and his face falls, at a loss.

"What am I going to do? Oh God, what am I going to do?" Sawyer lifts her chin again, as it threatens to lower.

"Well first, you're going to take us back to camp, and Jack's gonna fix up my arm." At this, Heather doesn't stop crying, but meets his eyes for the first time—her sobbing settles more in her throat. This is what she needs, Sawyer thinks. Right now, she needs someone to take the reins, at least until she can get back on her feet. He knows plenty about that. Gaining confidence in his story, he continues. "Sun and Jin will realize they're still madly in love, and can't bear to be apart any longer, and we'll have to all learn Korean for 'Get a room' and 'Not near the food'." At this, Heather lets out a low, bark like laugh, which is rough from crying. However, it's a genuine laugh, and her slight shaking ceases. "Then we'll get creepy knife-chucking Locke and go find those bastards. He'll pull some mystic hoodoo-warrior shit and we'll get Walt back." Heather smiles, but it's grim—her eyes unfixed and staring past him.

Sawyer can see her make a conscious effort to bring her mind back to focus, and then he is surprised to see the shadow of a smirk there.

"Locke will be glad to know you're alive."

"Why's that?" At his question, Heather snorts, looks away, as if embarrassed—capturing his interest perfectly, and he is happy to see that though her eyes still appear to be watering, they are away from the sobbing.

"I told him that if you died, I'd kill him." She looks back to him, smirk growing to a small, tired smile. "It may have been slightly more colorful than just that, though." She scratches her head, while Sawyer lets out an amused chuckle of his own, though he's also gauging her seriousness, which is hard to determine in the bad lighting. "Jack wasn't, uh, very pleased."

"You actually did then. In front of the Doc, even."

"In front of everyone," Then, she licks her lips, looks at him, and what he sees doesn't scare him, but it does chill him. "At gunpoint."

"You're not joking." She looks to ground again, more in shame than embarrassment this time. His tone becomes deeper: "Were you serious?"

"I-"

"Were you serious?"

"Yeah. I was." Sawyer whistles low through his teeth, wondering how he's supposed to feel about this. Did it mean that she was dedicated to him, or did it make her insane?

"You're going to have something to answer for when we get back." She shrugs. "Why Locke? Because of Boone?"

"Yeah. Something like that."

"Something?"

"He… he thinks we're like each other. He thinks this island is heaven-sent. He thinks I'll… come around or something. That he understands me." Locke of course had never directly came out and said any of this, but that was the thing about Locke. She could tell. And the fact that she could tell that he was thinking it didn't make it any better, because it only helped to prove whatever point he thought he was making.

"Does he?"

"No. He's the insane one." But he isn't the one waking up in fits, and holding others at gunpoint, telling them he'll kill them, she thinks. Sawyer refrains from voicing his thoughts, though she can tell he's thinking along the same lines. "That's my story and I'm sticking to it," Heather says, and the too of them lower their heads, closer together. Somehow, here by the fire, far away from camp, not to mention the bullet wound, the setting is intimate, as if they were in bed in the small hours before daybreak, chatting like lovers between plush sheets.

"Sawyer?" She is more serious now, and the crying has stopped.

"Yeah sweet thing?" Heather smiles at this, braces herself.

"I… I woke up screaming. Charlie says I was screaming for Walt… and someone named James." She looks at him, wincing in preparation, waiting for some kind of retaliation.

"That so now?"

"It's safe. They think I'm nuts anyway, right?"

"How long have you known then?"

"Probably since the day with Walt. I never looked for it though. I'm sorry."

"Don't be sorry." He sighs. "It's not your fault." Then, looking at her, gauging her in the way she remembers from when they first met. "So, why do you keep calling me Sawyer then? If you know, well, my real name I guess you'd call it." Heather licks her lips, thinks over this for a moment.

"Because I think you need to own it—what happened to you."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"You took the name of the guy who… who killed your parents. A therapist would have a field day with that one." She gives him a wan, weary smile. "You felt like you became what you hated. I think you need to face that-"

"You think I haven't?" Though she can tell that neither of them is in the mood for fighting, there is a challenge in his voice.

"No. You're still running from it. You don't want to face it, because you're afraid that there isn't anything else to you but… but Sawyer."

"Well thanks for the analysis," He quips, and she knows it's a sore topic for him. However, after a few moments of silence, his head inclines toward her, and she looks up. "So what do you think?"

"About Walt?" She asks, concerned. He shakes his head, doesn't meet her eyes, stares at the fire instead.

"No. About… forget it."

"Do I think you're more than what you've made out of yourself? That you can change?" She's watching him closely, but he doesn't really answer her, and she takes that as a yes. "Yeah. I do. I don't truck with lost causes, if that's any consolation." She smiles, but doesn't get one out of him. She lifts herself, scoots closer to him, side by side—this way she slings an arm around him, with her head resting against his uninjured shoulder. "We are all more than the worst things we've done in our lives, Sawyer."

"You don't know half of the things I've done," He grits out, but she doesn't move. She's heard this before, and more than a couple times from him. You're just hiding behind it, she wants to say. You say it because you're afraid that you might not be any better than what you've done—but you are.

"Maybe not. They aren't mine to live with. But I'll be here, whenever you decide you wanna try to sort it all out." The sun is not too far from rising, and Heather feels a deep cold in her stomach, knows that she's going to have to face Michael again, about heading back to camp first. She begins to brace herself, construct her days worth of armor.

"How'd you do it, anyway? Get us here?" Sawyer asks, and Heather enjoys the sensation of his voice vibrating through his chest, into her.

"Remember how I said that if you lost my solar powered battery pack I'd swim out there and kick your ass?" She smiles, begins to stretch while sitting. "Well, I'll save the latter for after we get back to the caves. I'm not evil enough to beat up on a guy who took a bullet-"

"Didn't answer my question."

"I know. I don't have an answer. I just did." Heather stares off over the water, to the horizon, where the sun is just coming up. She watches as Jin gets up, stretches a bit, and goes to Michael—he puts a hand on the man's shoulder, and then with a gentle word, walks towards the jungle, probably to relieve himself. She doesn't think anything of it, continues to watch as the water changes to an ocean of fire under the sun being born into the day. "I just said to myself: I'll move heaven and earth for him. And I did." Sawyer hangs his head for a minute, then stands—slow from the pain in his arm, and offers her his good hand. She takes it, but doesn't put much of her weight in it.

"I don't know anything about heaven missy, but that was fair impressive."

Suddenly, there is the sound of Jin yelling, and the three on the beach whirl, see the man come running out from the jungle. He's screaming in Korean, but it's obvious that something has happened, and that he's running from something. He trips, and Heather instinctually runs forward to help him up, even as he seems to be trying to tell the rest of them to run.

"Others!" Is the only thing she makes out as she tries to pull the man back to his feet, and then there is something blocking the morning light over her and-

-and she can hear the cracking sound of something connecting with the back of her skull, and then the distant feel of the sand against her cheek.